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Doug Engelbart Passes Away
lpress writes "If you use a mouse, hyperlinks, video conferencing, WYSIWYG word processor, multi-window user interface, shared documents, shared database, documents with images & text, keyword search, instant messaging, synchronous collaboration, or asynchronous collaboration, you can thank Doug Engelbart, who passed away today."
Guess he got first post
Thanks for all of your contributions to our computing.
I believe this is something that should be mandatory for all computer engineering/science students should watch, along with getting a bit of a history lesson:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfIgzSoTMOs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a11JDLBXtPQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61oMy7Tr-bM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNXLK78ZaFo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7zz1SwCTCEE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dVNxlLYTsQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XiJA7_Sw9aM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EI8LZKW5Lwk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VYDg2wr2QfI
The concepts for the time, in my opinion, are mind blowing. I hope there are some people in this world who are considering some equal mind blowing ideas for these times, although I do not think they could ever get pulled together into one demo like what Doug Engelbart did.
I got to see Doug speak about ten years ago. One thing he mentioned is that you can't let ease of use concerns limit capability. Ease of use is important but it can be sacrificed if necessary to give advanced capability. The example he gave was a bicycle. It's much more difficult to use than a tricycle but the benefits of bikes over trikes are so great that almost everyone goes through the effort to learn to use a bike instead of settling for a trike.
Doug never worked for Xerox.
He went from SRI to Tymshare.
Many people from Doug's lab went to work for PARC
In addition to the specific technical inventions, he did a lot of great work from the 1960s laying out how computers could augment human intellect. Most of his papers are available online, not only open-access but in readable HTML versions.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
You not only changed our world for the better, you were a good human being. Even with all your success you always remained thoughtful, generous, and kind. That touched my life even more than all the technological innovation. How you were with people was even more important than what you did for them.
Thanks for everything, and most of all thanks for being such a role model for me, Doug.
I'll miss you.
for those unsure of how to mourn, Here are a few tips.
Awesomewm users: remove dust from mouse (small black/beige peripheral.) place hand atop it for a moment of rememberence...both for doug and in trying to recall what people use this thing for
outlook users: Although its often said not to, today you may in fact click that link in your HTML email for "1000% DIS.CPUNT VJAGRA CIA.LIS"
Chatroulette users: Adjust the camera from its standard crotch-facing position to a more respectful head-facing position.
Microsoft Word users: Today, indulge clippy in his helpful banter and accept his offer of assistance in writing a letter. Embrace the ensuing application crash as proof that the spirit of Doug lives on.
VAX users: Get back to work installing VMS 5.0. Forget you ever heard of 'windowed' interfaces. also those TPS reports, we need them by EOD...so lets plan for saturday.
Excel users: As you stalk from cubicle to cubicle hunting for the rat-bastard who left the spreadsheet open this evening, ponder Dougs wisdom of shared documents and its profound impact on your ability to hunt down pudgy white coworkers, like some kind of middle aged predator.
Oracle users: Send a support ticket. Approach your multi million dollar obelisk of remorse and sorrow. slowly push unmarked $100 bills into the ventillation slots. Weep in knowing this is not what Doug intended.
PDF users: chances are youre holding a document that is nothing but an image with text...no search for you, so you may as well ponder Dougs infinite wisdom as you mash away at the spacebar in time to lady gagas judas.
YouTube users: "Doug Engelbart Harlem Shake Americas Got Talent" is certainly a mournful keyword search.
Management: each time you bored us with tales of (a)synchronous collaboration, know that it was pushing this great man one step closer to the grave. If you'd stuck to the 1 hour meeting rule and not called it on a friday, this man may still be alive today.
Good people go to bed earlier.
Those three rarely come together.
RIP, Doug, and thanks for all the clicks!
May Peace Prevail On Earth
I met Doug and spoke with him a few times when we were both at Tymnet, which was purchased by McDonnell Douglas in 1985. At the time, Doug had a shock or white hair but was still cranking out ideas. At that time, he was working very hard to sell his idea of a chord keyboard -- you had five keys for each hand and you "played" them to control the computer. Doug was amazing with them -- he code program and write documents extraordinarily fast with them. He thought that DEC might buy the idea and turn it into a product, but obviously that didn't happen. Doug was always thinking a generation ahead -- recall that at that time, we had not really accepted the mouse yet. But from Doug's perspective that was old news from almost twenty years ago. Talking to him was amazing -- just trying to get into the frame of mind he was in was challenging and fun. I wish I could have spent more time with him. Thanks for everything, Doug -- we still haven't caught up with you.
Yes, it is amazing how quickly the next generation or two can forget (or never learn) history. It is a constant struggle to keep the best of the past alive in our collective memories. And I say that not just as a trustee of a historical society. How many people who read slashdot have read "As We May Think" about a hypothetical "Memex" by Vannevar Bush that helped inspire Doug Engelbart's work, or "The Skills Of Xanadu" that helped inspire Ted Nelson's own work on hypertext that contributed to the World Wide Web among other things including research in nanotechnology? One of the things Doug made possible was potentially improving our collective memory, but it is hard to avoid getting weighed down in trivia.
I participated in Doug's Unfinished Revolution II colloquium (Unrev-II) run as ten sessions through Stanford and then the mailing list continued related discussions for a couple more years.
http://dougengelbart.org/colloquium/
http://dougengelbart.org/colloquium/forum/discussion/
http://dougengelbart.org/colloquium/forum/ba-unrev-talk/index.html
It was one of the best on-line experiences I've had overall.
I feel Doug's story shows why our conventional means of funding computer research via companies and grants and such are flawed. Here is the inventor of the mouse and a variety of amazing things, a very nice guy personally, and he had lots of difficulty getting funding in later years to continue innovative work. If he couldn't funding to do work on computers to make the world a better place, better able to deal with pressing problems, than who can? So, that suggests a need for a basic income, a gift economy, or some other economic approach, so individuals who want to do such work will have the time to do it, regardless of a previous track record.
A few of my many posts to those email lists, covering predicting the OLPC, talking about the singularity and S-curve limitations, asking about the moral basis of our innovations, and linking poetry and knowledge management:
http://dougengelbart.org/colloquium/forum/discussion/0061.html
http://dougengelbart.org/colloquium/forum/discussion/0126.html
http://dougengelbart.org/colloquium/forum/discussion/0754.html
http://dougengelbart.org/colloquium/forum/discussion/1881.html
http://dougengelbart.org/colloquium/forum/discussion/2168.html
Anyway, it's a sad day. But I'm glad he got his chance to work on really cool stuff in hopes of helping humanity.
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.